720 research outputs found
Individualisation and fertility
"In this paper, the authors discuss individualization theory as a parsimonious framework concept to describe and explain core points of fertility change in Western societies since the end of the 19th century. They emphasize two dimensions of individualization: firstly, the increase in status of the individual in cultural, social, economic and legal respects (human dignity); secondly, the increase in autonomy and freedom of choice. In contrast to other approaches based on individualization theory, the authors do not use the concept of self-realization in the sense of an increased orientation towards purely individual interests, not least because this concept has failed before the renewed rise in fertility that has recently been observed in some advanced societies. They discuss the relevance of these two dimensions of individualization in the context of the first transition and the 1960s with its declining fertility rates. Whereas the first demographic transition can be mainly explained by the rising status of children, which increased the costs of parenting and thus changed the interests of (potential) parents to have children, the transition in the 1960s resulted mainly from the rising status of women in education and the labor market. An important but hitherto neglected change was the increasing divorce rates, as the possibility to dissolve a marriage devalued the traditional gender contract of the breadwinner/ housewife model and decreased the willingness of women and men to invest in marriage and children. The contrast between the recently growing fertility rates in Sweden, France and the US with the continuously low fertility in the German-speaking countries can partly be seen as a result of different divorce regimes. Whereas the first group of countries has limited the entitlement to spousal support through alimonies, the second group has institutionalized extensive entitlements for mothers." (author's abstract
Dry etching of monocrystalline silicon using a laser-induced reactive micro plasma
Dry etching is a prevalent technique for pattern transfer and material removal in microelectronics, optics and photonics due to its high precision material removal with low surface and subsurface damage. These processes, including reactive ion etching (RIE) and plasma etching (PE), are performed at vacuum conditions and provide high selectivity and vertical side wall etched patterns but create high costs and efforts in maintenance due to the required machinery. In contrast to electrically generated plasmas, laser-induced micro plasmas are controllable sources of reactive species in gases at atmospheric pressure that can be used for dry etching of materials. In the present study, we have demonstrated the laser-induced plasma etching of monocrystalline silicon. A Ti:Sapphire laser has been used for igniting an optically pumped plasma in a CF4/O2 gas mixture near atmospheric pressure. The influence of process parameters, like substrate temperature, O2 concentration, plasma-surface distance, etching duration, pulse energy and crystal orientation on etching rate and surface morphology has been investigated. Typical etching rates of 2â12 ”m x minâ1 can be achieved by varying mentioned parameters with a decreasing etching rate during the process. Different morphologies can be observed due to the parameters set, smooth as well as rough surfaces or even inverted pyramids. The presented etching method provides an approach for precise machining of silicon surfaces with good surface qualities near atmospheric pressure and sufficiently high material removal rates for ultraprecise surface machining. © 2021 The Author(s
Ad 2.0: a novel recombineering platform for high-throughput generation of tailored adenoviruses
stranded DNA genome of 26-45 kb were broadly explored in basic virology, for vaccination purposes, for treatment of tumors based on oncolytic virotherapy, or simply as a tool for efficient gene transfer. However, the majority of recombinant adenoviral vectors (AdVs) is based on a small fraction of adenovirus types and their genetic modification. Recombineering techniques provide powerful tools for arbitrary engineering of recombinant DNA. Here, we adopted a seamless recombineering technology for high-throughput and arbitrary genetic engineering of recombinant adenoviral DNA molecules. Our cloning platform which also includes a novel recombination pipeline is based on bacterial artificial chromosomes (BACs). It enables generation of novel recombinant adenoviruses from different sources and switching between commonly used early generation AdVs and the last generation high-capacity AdVs lacking all viral coding sequences making them attractive candidates for clinical use. In combination with a novel recombination pipeline allowing cloning of AdVs containing large and complex transgenes and the possibility to generate arbitrary chimeric capsid-modified adenoviruses, these techniques allow generation of tailored AdVs with distinct features. Our technologies will pave the way toward broader applications of AdVs in molecular medicine including gene therapy and vaccination studies
Choose your path wisely: gradient descent in a Bregman distance framework
We propose an extension of a special form of gradient descent --- in the
literature known as linearised Bregman iteration -- to a larger class of
non-convex functions. We replace the classical (squared) two norm metric in the
gradient descent setting with a generalised Bregman distance, based on a
proper, convex and lower semi-continuous function. The algorithm's global
convergence is proven for functions that satisfy the Kurdyka-\L ojasiewicz
property. Examples illustrate that features of different scale are being
introduced throughout the iteration, transitioning from coarse to fine. This
coarse-to-fine approach with respect to scale allows to recover solutions of
non-convex optimisation problems that are superior to those obtained with
conventional gradient descent, or even projected and proximal gradient descent.
The effectiveness of the linearised Bregman iteration in combination with early
stopping is illustrated for the applications of parallel magnetic resonance
imaging, blind deconvolution as well as image classification with neural
networks
Shadowgraph studies of laser-assisted non-thermal structuring of thin layers on flexible substrates by shock-wave-induced delamination processes
Det grundlĂ€ggande temat för denna rapport Ă€r âMöten över grĂ€nserâ. HĂ€r avses de grĂ€nser man kan mĂ€rka mellan de olika aktörer som av olika anledning befinner sig pĂ„ ett Ă€ldreboende.NĂ„gra bor dĂ€r pĂ„ grund av sjukdom eller funktionsnedsĂ€ttning, andra arbetar dĂ€r medanĂ„ter andra Ă€r mer eller mindre tillfĂ€lliga besökare. Ăven om det rĂ„der öppenhet och gemenskapkan kontakter mellan mĂ€nniskor försvĂ„ras av brist pĂ„ naturliga mötesplatser.De erfarenheter studien gett oss skiljer sig inte nĂ€mnvĂ€rt frĂ„n de förvĂ€ntade. Resultatet bekrĂ€ftar de teorier vi haft om vikten av mötesplatser, men ocksĂ„ om mĂ€nniskors behov av att kunna dra sig undan andra och försjunka i egna tankar. Vi har fĂ„tt mĂ„nga bevis för hur viktigt det Ă€r att arbeta för en normaliserande tillvaro för de boende. Den litteratur vi lĂ€st stöder i stort de teorier vi haft och de rön vi gjort.Vi har valt att anvĂ€nda oss av trĂ€dgĂ„rdsrummet som en möjlig mötesplats och en plats för naturlig aktivitet och har dĂ€rför anlagt en trĂ€dgĂ„rd i anslutning till de bĂ„da avdelningarna vid boendet. Boende och övriga personalgruppen har lĂ€mnat önskemĂ„l om trĂ€dgĂ„rdens innehĂ„lloch flera boende har varit aktiva i anlĂ€ggningsarbetet. Under arbetets gĂ„ng har personalgruppenvarit engagerad i att observera och notera eventuella effekter och hĂ€ndelser som varit relaterade till trĂ€dgĂ„rden.VĂ„r förhoppning har varit att trĂ€dgĂ„rden med tiden skulle komma att kĂ€nnas som en angelĂ€genhet för alla dĂ€r de kunde finna sitt eget sĂ€tt att anvĂ€nda den. NĂ€r vi nu nĂ„tt slutet av projekttiden ser vi att denna förhoppning i stort infriats och att man över lag kĂ€nner delaktighetoch engagemang i arbetet i och omkring trĂ€dgĂ„rden.Vi har naturligtvis stĂ€llts inför situationer dĂ€r vi fĂ„tt revidera vĂ„ra idĂ©er. Detta har bidragit till att alla gjorts delaktiga i processen kring anlĂ€ggandet av trĂ€dgĂ„rden. MĂ„nga idĂ©er har stötts och blötts vid mĂ„ltider och kaffepauser, och slutprodukten har blivit en annan Ă€n vi frĂ„n början tĂ€nkt oss.Intresset frĂ„n andra boenden, politiker och mĂ€nniskor i allmĂ€nhet har varit stort och vi har dĂ€rför redan fĂ„tt mĂ„nga tillfĂ€llen att berĂ€tta om vĂ„rt arbete. I framtiden kommer vi vara aktiva i att sprida vĂ„ra idĂ©er och försöka inspirera andra till eget förĂ€ndringsarbete.Sponsorship:FoU SjuhĂ€rad VĂ€lfĂ€rd</p
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Self-cleaning stainless steel surfaces induced by laser processing and chemical engineering
Nanostructured surfaces show a variety of beneficial macroscopic effects. The combination of hierarchic nanostructures with a suitable chemical surface composition allows for the fabrication of surfaces with interesting fluidic properties beyond such effects. This approach enables the specification of nano/microstructure and chemical composition independent of each other. Various hierarchical micro- and nanostructures can be realized by laser texturing of stainless steel surfaces with infrared picosecond laser. Simultaneously, the surface is activated for chemical processing. The surface can now be tuned by bonding of a self-assembled monolayer on the laser-treated surface by chemical treatment. This two-step functionalization process allows the for separated adjusting of the surface topography and chemical composition and thus for the well-defined setting of the surface properties. The fabrication of superhydrophobic surfaces with self-cleaning properties are performed that can be functionalized further by subsequent laser-irradiation. Furthermore, the long-time stability of the surface functionalization in relation to the impact chemicals or radiation was investigated
In vivo imaging enables high resolution preclinical trials on patients' leukemia cells growing in mice.
Xenograft mouse models represent helpful tools for preclinical studies on human tumors. For modeling the complexity of the human disease, primary tumor cells are by far superior to established cell lines. As qualified exemplary model, patients' acute lymphoblastic leukemia cells reliably engraft in mice inducing orthotopic disseminated leukemia closely resembling the disease in men. Unfortunately, disease monitoring of acute lymphoblastic leukemia in mice is hampered by lack of a suitable readout parameter
RELATE: Physically Plausible Multi-Object Scene Synthesis Using Structured Latent Spaces
We present RELATE, a model that learns to generate physically plausible
scenes and videos of multiple interacting objects. Similar to other generative
approaches, RELATE is trained end-to-end on raw, unlabeled data. RELATE
combines an object-centric GAN formulation with a model that explicitly
accounts for correlations between individual objects. This allows the model to
generate realistic scenes and videos from a physically-interpretable
parameterization. Furthermore, we show that modeling the object correlation is
necessary to learn to disentangle object positions and identity. We find that
RELATE is also amenable to physically realistic scene editing and that it
significantly outperforms prior art in object-centric scene generation in both
synthetic (CLEVR, ShapeStacks) and real-world data (cars). In addition, in
contrast to state-of-the-art methods in object-centric generative modeling,
RELATE also extends naturally to dynamic scenes and generates videos of high
visual fidelity. Source code, datasets and more results are available at
http://geometry.cs.ucl.ac.uk/projects/2020/relate/
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Secondary electron yield engineering of copper surfaces by 532 nm ultrashort laser pulses
Nanostructured surfaces exhibit outstanding properties and enable manifold industrial applications. In this study the laser surface processing of polycrystalline, flat copper surfaces by 532 nm picosecond laser irradiation for secondary electron yield (SEY) reduction is reported. The laser beam was scanned in parallel lines across the sample surface in order to modify large surface areas. Morphology and SEY are characterized in dependence of the process parameters to derive correlations and mechanisms of the laser-based SEY engineering process. The nano- and microstructure morphology of the laser-modified surface was characterized by scanning electron microscopy and the secondary electron yield was measured. In general, an SEY reduction with increasing accumulated laser fluence was found. In particular, at low scanning speed (1 mm/s - 10 mm/s) and âhighâ laser power (~ 1 W) compact nanostructures with a very low SEY maximum of 0.7 are formed
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